Chris Murphy has advantage in primary and general election, poll shows

Public Policy Polling, weighing in two weeks before the primaries, on Tuesday said Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Chris Murphy and Republican candidate Linda McMahon are the strong favorites, with the GOP contest “pretty much over.”

Linda McMahon (New Haven Register Photo/Peter Casolino)

They also have Murphy starting out the general election race ahead of McMahon, with McMahon having high unfavorable ratings among voters, but doing better than Murphy among the important unaffiliated voters, which constitute the largest group in Connecticut.

Weighted against this, PPP said, is a cross-over factor for Murphy, who gets 19 percent of Republicans coming over to vote for him.

“Her problem is that she’s getting only 74 percent of the Republican vote, with 19 percent of GOP voters crossing over to support Murphy. We see very few races anywhere these days where a Democrat’s getting 19 percent of the Republican vote and it’s an indication that McMahon is simply unacceptable to some voters within the party,” according to Tom Jensen of PPP.

“Democrats will go into the general election favored to win this race. It might be closer than they’d like in Connecticut, but Murphy has the clear advantage for both the primary and general,” Jensen said.

PPP has McMahon with a 48 percentage point margin over former U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays, with 68 percent of Republican primary voters in the former wrestling executive’s corner to 20 percent for Shays.

Worse than that for Shays, PPP said GOP voters” flat out dislike Shays, with only 37 percent rating him favorably to 40 percent with a negative opinion. That’s pretty unusual to see in a primary.”

PPP said McMahon leads Shays 67 percent to 25 percent even among moderates, which they thought he should have done well with. This gap expands to 76 percent in favor of McMahon to 13 percent for Shays among conservatives.

Tim Murtaugh, spokesman for McMahon, said the campaign had no comment on the poll.

Amanda Bergen, spokeswoman for Shays, said summer polls for primaries “are highly unreliable. If everyone who supports Chris comes out on Aug. 14, he will win the primary,” emphasizing the importance of turn out.

She said after spending some $10 million in this election cycle and $50 million in 2010, almost half the voters don’t have a favorable opinion of McMahon.

“She can’t win in November,” Bergen said.

Democratic Senate candidate for U.S. Senate, former Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz, speaks during a debate. (AP Photo/The Hartford Courant, John Woike, Pool)

The polling group said it is closer for Murphy and his opponent, former Sec. of the State Susan Bysiewicz, with Murphy the clear favorite with 49 percent of the vote to 32 percent for Bysiewicz.

This is a 6 percentage point lead over what PPP found when it looked at this in September.

Unlike in the GOP contest, Murphy is leading in all ideological groups across the Democratic spectrum. He also is ahead of Bysiewicz with both men and women 44 percent to 34 percent and is strong among younger voters, 52 percent to 25 percent.

They said Murphy will also start out as the favorite in his likely general election contest with McMahon.

Murphy leads McMahon 50 percent to 42 percent, almost identical to his 50 percent to 43 percent advantage in the poll taken 10 months ago.

PPP found McMahon is popular with the GOP base, but her numbers are not good with the overall electorate.

It said 42 percent of voters rate her favorably to 48 percent who have an unfavorable opinion.

Murphy is still not as well known as McMahon, who ran and lost to Richard Blumenthal in 2010. He is however, generally seen positively by the voters who are familiar with him, according to the poll.

It said 38 percent rate him positively while 31 percent have a negative opinion.

PPP found that McMahon actually leads Murphy 53 percent to 36 percent with independent voters and Murphy does not have problems with his Democratic base with 82 percent in his corner.

PPP said there is a “clear electability difference on the Democratic side.”

Bysiewicz would lead McMahon in a hypothetical match up but only by 3 points at 45 percent to 42 percent, much less than Murphy.

“Shays is so far behind his general election numbers are barely worth noting. He would actually trail Murphy by even more than McMahon at 47 percent to 38 percent, suggesting that his early electability advantage has dissipated,” according to the poll.

Shays would lead Bysiewicz 43 percent to 40 percent in what they called an unlikely matchup. Democrats will go into the general election favored to win this race.